|
Books by Henry Louis
Gates, Jr.
Colored People /
Our Nig /
The African American Century /
The Bondwoman's Narrative /
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Man
The Trials of Phillis Wheatley /
"Race," Writing, and Difference /
Wonders of the African World
In Search of Identity /
Speaking of Race, Speaking of Sex /
The Signifying Monkey
Cosmopolitanism /
Identity and Violence /
The Norton Anthology of African American Literature
* *
* * *
Lincoln on Race and Slavery
Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Interviewed by
Kam Williams
Henry Louis “Skip”
Gates, Jr. was born in Piedmont, West Virginia on
September 16, 1950 to Henry, Sr. and Pauline Coleman.
Today, he is a world-renowned scholar and educator and
the Alphonse Fletcher Professor at Harvard University.
In his capacity as a
public intellectual, he has served as host of
“African-American Lives,” a PBS series which employs a
combination of genealogy and science to reconstruct the
family trees of the descendants of slaves. And just last
year, he co-founded “The Root,” a sophisticated website
dedicated to the concerns of the black intelligentsia.
Here, in conjunction
with the celebration of the bicentennial of the birth of
Abraham Lincoln, Professor Gates discusses two new
projects revolving around the 16th President, his book,
Lincoln on Race and Slavery, and his PBS special,
“Looking for Lincoln.”
* *
* * *
KW:
Hi Dr. Gates, I’m honored to have this opportunity to
speak with you.
SG:
No, it’s my pleasure.
KW:
Where should I start? What approach did you take in
terms of producing your new PBS series on Lincoln?
SG:
Lincoln’s myth is so capacious that each generation of
Americans has been able to find its own image reflected
in the mirror of Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln is our “Man
for All Seasons.” There’s a Communist Lincoln, a
Republican Lincoln, Lincoln the writer, Lincoln the
orator, Lincoln the atheist, Lincoln the Christian,
Lincoln the war criminal, Lincoln the Savior of the
Union, the Confederate Lincoln, the African-American
Lincoln, etcetera. So, I wanted to look at all these
myths about Lincoln, deconstruct them, and see what the
actual man was like. And, frankly, I also wanted to
confront the complexity of his attitudes towards slavery
and racial equality, which weren’t exactly the same
thing. For, while he was fundamentally opposed to
slavery, it took him a while to embrace racial equality.
KW:
As a person who majored in black studies, I appreciated
the fact that you included
Lerone Bennett and a
discussion of his 650-page biography of Lincoln,
Forced
into Glory. Bennett’s ordinarily overlooked when it
comes to Lincoln scholars, since he indicts the 16th
President as a racist who very reluctantly freed the
slaves.
SG:
Thank you. First of all, I admire
Lerone Bennett.
When I was 18, I read his essay in Ebony Magazine, “Was
Abe Lincoln a White Supremacist?” At the time, I didn’t
have the intellectual sophistication to judge his
evidence. But of course it was a shock when I read it.
KW:
Did you enjoy doing research for the series?
SG:
It was a delight! [Chuckles] Doing this film was a
learning experience for me, because I hadn’t explored
much of the Lincoln scholarship other than George
Fredrickson’s last book. [Big
Enough to Be Inconsistent: Abraham Lincoln Confronts
Slavery and Race] I went back to read Lincoln’s own
words and what historians had to say about him.
KW:
What did you learn?
SG:
That he was an enormously complex man… that he had his
flaws, but he changed. He progressed. He changed during
the Civil War. Through the efforts of Frederick Douglass
and the achievements of the 200,000 black men who fought
in the Union Army, he came to have new respect for black
people. And, in fact, in his last speech he advocated
the right to vote for the black veterans and for the
“very intelligent Negroes.” That’s what made John Wilkes
Booth kill him. Booth was in the audience, and said,
“That’s it. That means [N-word] citizenship. And I’m
going to run him through.” So, Lincoln literally gave
his life for espousing black rights.
KW:
On the show, historian
Doris Kearns Goodwin
says,
“It’s not Lincoln’s fault that he was mythologized.
Lincoln had to live in his times.” You responded to her
by saying, “Doris was right,” and “I’ve come to admire
him.” How did you get to that point?
SG:
I really got to that point in the middle of that
interview. I had been walking around upset with
Lincoln’s reluctance to support equal rights and his
determination to free the slaves but to encourage them
to migrate to Panama, Haiti or Liberia. Doris said,
“You’re upset because you feel like you’ve been lied to.
But Lincoln didn’t lie to you. The historians did.”
There’s a cult of Lincoln among some historians who feel
almost like they’re the disciples of Christ. Lincoln is
like a secular Christ in America. So, once I could get
straight about who to be upset with, I was fine.
KW: Another thing
you said which upset me was when you spoke about
Lincoln’s being the seminal story in American History.
Do you really think that Lincoln has replaced the
Founding Fathers, the Declaration of Independence, and
the rest of the Colonial Period?
SG: Oh, sure,
absolutely. The primal event in American History, other
than the founding itself, is the Civil War, saving the
Union, defending the Constitution, and redefining the
Declaration of Independence to include all men, which
Lincoln did. Lincoln was very consistent about that. So,
whereas you can’t have subsequent events without the
founding, it really was the Civil War which was the
truly great American Revolution.
KW: Tell me a little about
Lincoln on Race and Slavery.
SG: In this book,
I examine three strands of thought. Imagine a braid of
hair. Most of just us say, “Lincoln freed the slaves,
therefore he liked black people.” That’s the braid, but
it turns out the braid has three strands. One strand is
how he felt about slavery; another is how he felt about
racial equality, and the third is colonization. We find
contradictory impulses in Lincoln at least through 1863
when he finally begins to do the right thing, and all
three strands are re-connected into a new braid.
KW: What do you think about our new president?
SG: I think Barack Obama is going to be one of the
best presidents in the history of this republic.
KW: Is there a question you’ve never been asked,
that you wish someone would?
SG: [Chuckles] I’ve pretty much been asked
everything… Here’s one: Why do I do what I do?
KW: Why do you do what you do?
SG: Because I love black people, and my goal is to
restore black history from on the grand scale, the broad
sweep of history, down to the level of each black
person’s family tree.
KW: Speaking of family trees, will there be a third
season of African-American Lives?
SG: My next
series is called “Faces of America,” where I’ll be
tracing the roots of two Jewish-Americans, two
Arab-Americans, two Latino-Americans, two
Asian-Americans, two West Indian-Americans, two Irish
Americans and an Italian-American. So, we’ll be
employing the same genetics and genealogy format, but
for the broader American public. I’m very excited about
it.
KW: When I
interviewed Lisa Kudrow, she told me a similar British
TV-series is helping her trace her roots which had sort
of hit a dead end with the Holocaust as far as she
knew.
SG: Yeah, these
genealogy shows are popping up everywhere now. And most
of them are the sons and daughters of African-American
Lives, so I’m very proud of that.
KW: I remember you traced most of your roots back to
Ireland.
SG: Only on my father’s side. I definitely have
something called the U Neill Haplotype on my father’s
sign, which means I’m related to 8% of all the men in
Ireland. [Chuckles]
KW: The Tasha Smith question: Are you ever afraid?
SG: Sure, I was afraid the American people weren’t
going to do the right thing and overcome centuries of
discrimination by voting for the better candidate. A
month ago, my 95 year-old father had pneumonia and I was
afraid.
KW: 95! God bless him!
SG: Thanks. A little fear is a good thing. Being
paralyzed by fear, however, is not a good thing.
KW: Why did you
stay at Harvard during the great exodus of so many other
African-American professors after they were mistreated
by then Harvard President Larry Summers (who is now in
the Obama administration)?
SG: I stayed to
defend what I,
Cornell West,
Anthony Appiah,
former Harvard President
Neil Rudenstine and our
other colleagues had all built. I felt that it would be
vulnerable, if I left. That’s why I stayed, and it was
the right decision.
KW: How are Harvard students different from
Princeton students?
SG: I’ve never taught Princeton students.
KW: Wait, I live in Princeton, and I used to see you
around town and even met you here at an NAACP function.
SG: I was at the
Institute for Advance Study while on leave from Harvard.
But I didn’t teach. I was on sabbatical. However, I
would imagine that the students are just as smart and as
energetic and wonderful as the students at Harvard.
They’re from the same gene pool. [Chuckles]
KW: The Columbus Short question: Are you happy?
SG: I’m a very happy person. My life has been such a
fantasy, I’m sometimes afraid that I’m going to wake up
and it’ll turn out that I’ve been in a coma.
KW: That’s the vibe you give off, like Alicia Keys,
who has a very grounded vibe.
SG: Yeah, she’s very centered.
KW: The bookworm Troy Johnson question: What was the
last book you read?
SG: A biography of
Alain Locke by Leonard Harris
and Chalres Molesworth.
KW: The Rudy Lewis question: Who’s at the top of
your hero list?
SG: My mother, Pauline Coleman Gates, who is
deceased, and my father, Henry Louis Gates, Sr.
KW: What was the biggest obstacle you’ve ever had to
overcome?
SG: I had an
infected hip replacement, a 300,000 white blood cell
count, which is huge. So, I had to have emergency
surgery, because I could have died. I wasn’t frightened,
but that was the biggest obstacle. That’s when you’ve
descended into the valley of the shadows, and you have
to fight to come back. And fortunately, I made it.
KW: The music maven Heather Covington question: What
music are you listening to?
SG: I almost
exclusively listen to Soul Street on XM Radio, Channel
60. It’s R&B from the Fifties and Sixties. I’m just an
old-school black man.
KW: The Laz Alonso question: How can your fans help
you?
SG: I want them to watch my programs and then give
me their feedback and tell me what they think. That’s
the best way they can help.
KW: What advice do you have for a young black kid
who wants to follow in your footsteps?
SG: Overall, by
staying in school, deferring gratification and believing
in the power of education is the way that we can help
ourselves as a people.
KW: How do you want to be remembered?
SG: As a man who loved black people, and who fought
to preserve their great cultural traditions!
KW: Thanks again for the time, Dr. Gates.
SG: Thank you, buddy.
To see a trailer for Looking for Lincoln
hosted by Skip Gates,
visit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p91V-BHfe6k
* *
* * *
Looking for Lincoln
PBS-TV Film Review by
Kam Williams
What’s the truth about Abraham Lincoln? Was he really the man
mythologized as “The Great Emancipator” and a champion of equality for
African-Americans? Or was he, as some detractors say, a racist only
freed the slaves as a last resort to save the Union because the North
was losing the Civil War. Or still again, was he, as unrepentant rebels
still describe, a traitor of Southern whites who single-handedly ruined
the nation forever with the Emancipation Proclamation.
These are the divergent points-of-view of the 16th President of the
United States presented in Looking for Lincoln, a 2-part PBS
Series hosted by Harvard University Professor Henry Louis “Skip” Gates.
Among the historians weighing-in is Ebony Magazine editor Emeritus
Lerone Bennett, Jr. author of
Forced
into Glory, a
damning biography which depicts Honest Abe as a hypocrite who enslaved
far more blacks than he ever freed. And at the other extreme, Gates
interviews some rednecks he tracked down at a sons of the Confederacy
convention who looked like they were ready to string him up if he pushed
the issue.
Not
surprisingly, most of the luminaries participating in the program tend
to speak of Lincoln in more glowing terms. Included in this group are
Pulitzer Prize-winners Doris Kearns Goodwin and Tony Kushner, former
Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, and Professors David Blight,
Allen Guelzo, James Horton and David Herbert.
As
usual with his PBS programs, Skip Gates is given to making some of his
typically-grating, nails-on-the-blackboard pronouncements, such as “If I
had been President, I would have followed the same blueprint.”
Equally-infuriating is his saying “Doris was right,” in going out of his
way to rubber-stamp Kearns Goodwin’s lame explanation for Abe’s
decades-long delay in joining the abolitionist movement. “Lincoln had to
live in his times,” she explains.
Perhaps even more ponderous is her assertion that “It’s not Lincoln’s
fault that he was mythologized” despite her adding to the mystique with
her best seller “Team of Rivals.” Then, she makes the equally-bizarre
claim that he was assassinated “on the happiest day of his life” without
providing any conclusive proof to draw such a dramatic conclusion.
Nonetheless, Looking for Lincoln is a worthwhile bio-pic which
knocks off his pedestal an American icon undeserving of secular
sainthood.
Excellent (4 stars) ? Rated: TV-PG / Running time: 120 minutes /
Studio: PBS
To see a trailer for
Looking for Lincoln hosted by Skip Gates, visit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p91V-BHfe6k
* *
* * *
* *
* * *
posted 17 February 2009
|
